My conspirators busy conspiring at Thursday's rehearsal. 

First full run through yesterday. With words and movements. 

Missing only four of the cast which would have proved an insurmountable problem with my last show which boasted a perfectly formed cast of five. But for this, at just under a sixth of the total head count, seemed like a skippy walk in the park.

You know the way the world swirled about in dark unformed chaos before God / the Big Bang created the world? I expected that. Judging from the last time we attempted the crowd scenes. 

Instead I got

(I'm assuming you know your Bible)

Light.

Some sort of (albeit straggly and sometimes uncertain) Order. 

My Birmingham-based conspirator was disadvantaged by having been Alpine for the past week.

The kids were disadvantaged by, in some cases, having never done this or that scene before. 

But the rest of the grown people were, for the most part, apparently in control. 

With flashes of Nice Little Moments. 

As (I think) Antony says at one point in Shakespeare's sequel: "I am satisfied".

My phone (from which I sometimes blog) isn't co-operating at the moment. So imagine you're reading this on Friday just gone:

Nine rehearsals in and a pleased director. I think it's more or less blocked. Small hiccups like holiday absences to one side, I think we have a more or less complete set of significant scrawls denoting movements alongside getting on for most of the lines. Which is not inconsiderably exciting given that we still have two months and a tiny bit till the show is on. 

Last night, we did the back end of the play. Final five scenes, more or less in a row. And they - in beautiful contrast to Tuesday's fleshy middle of the play - almost looked organised. 

We have some fine old performances shaping up already on account of my really pretty brilliant cast. Now we just need to make sure they know what all the words mean. 

Easy.

Seven rehearsals in. Three Sundays and four midweek slots.

The production (practical) side of things has shuddered into life. Many and most thanks to Graham for a suitably striking publicity image. Ongoing thanks to Costume Mistress Chloe for continued attention to what the cast might put on their bodies during show week. And the musical team had their first meeting last week, simultaneous to a rehearsal so that is now starting to lollop along too.

The acting was the bit that worried me more, on account of this foolish / fashionable notion of encouraging naturalistic performances by urging the cast to "block" themselves. But in actuality, on account of being blessed with an astoundingly competent cast, even this portion of the production appears to be a relative breeze. The odd "not listening" incident but with such a huge cast, I would expect this to happen more often that it (to date) has.

Only one rageful moment to date and that only arose when I felt BS was (justifiably) laughing at me. But I made sure to remember my audience (I haven't worked with many of them before), succumbed to an impatient snap and then tried to appear good-humoured, relaxed and devil-may-care again. As I surely always do - right?

Equilibrium is, it must be said, much aided by my two stellar assistant directors. While I herd cats, they scribe and scribble and make sense of the chaotic wanderings, ensuring that these are committed to paper for posterity. I salute them for I'd possibly have lost hair without them by now.

Mind, I say this and Tuesday (tomorrow) will be the real test. As on this day (tomorrow), I have not just the speakers for critical rabble rousing scenes two, seven and eight but I have all associated waifs and strays scheduled to descend on our far too small rehearsal rooms to block the crowds. Then the fun shall really begin.

Work begins on the costumes by the sweet and clever and extremely talented costume designer, Chloe. 

Belts ahoy.

The conspirators at work. Sort of.

And what JC's about, according to the plebs....

Don't want to ruin things if you're gonna come and see it (last week in November) but this is a sneak peak of the Julius Caesar story from Sunday's session, courtesy of Mark Antony.

Is this possibly the most adorable contribution to a character development session ever?

From Strato. Aged 8.

And the fabulous thing is - he's just spot on.

Day one of rehearsals.
I'm very excitable.
(And excited.)
(But more excitable on consideration of all the creative stuff that's starting to happen.)

The MD was muttering on Friday about a capella beds of sound.
The costume girl has just succeeded after days of fruitless attempts to send me a Pinterest board of her thinking.
I have a fine old plan mapped out for today's rehearsal, including Worksheets. Which will chill today's chosen few cast members' hearts.

So I think that might mean we're up and running.

A very excitable eeeek.